{"id":201164,"date":"2026-04-17T20:48:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T20:48:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/201164\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T20:48:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T20:48:10","slug":"nyc-judge-declines-to-dismiss-case-in-1979-disappearance-of-jewish-boy-etan-patz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/201164\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC judge declines to dismiss case in 1979 disappearance of Jewish boy Etan Patz"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 The murder case surrounding the 1979 disappearance of Etan Patz, a 6-year-old Jewish boy, is on track for a third trial, after a judge declined Friday to dismiss charges against the onetime New York shop clerk charged with abducting and killing the boy on his way to school.<\/p>\n

The man, Pedro Hernandez, 65, has been behind bars since his\u00a02012 arrest. He is due back in court in June for a status update. A trial date has not yet been set.<\/p>\n

Etan\u2019s disappearance \u2014 on a two-block walk to his school bus stop on the first day his mom let him go unaccompanied \u2014 became one of the United States\u2019 most well-known missing child cases. He was among the first vanished kids to be pictured on milk cartons, and the May 25 anniversary of his disappearance became National Missing Children\u2019s Day. His parents\u2019 advocacy helped enhance law enforcement\u2019s response to such cases.<\/p>\n

A trial date has not yet been set in the wake of New York Judge Michele Rodney\u2019s ruling. Hernandez will be in court in June for a status update.<\/p>\n

Hernandez, now 65, was a 19-year-old corner store clerk in Etan\u2019s neighborhood, and he was among many locals police met and interviewed in the immediate aftermath of the boy\u2019s disappearance. But they didn\u2019t suspect him then.<\/p>\n

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More than three decades of frustrating, inconclusive investigation followed. For years, authorities\u00a0eyed another man\u00a0who was never charged. Then, in 2012, investigators got a tip that Hernandez had told various people in his life years ago that he\u2019d killed a child or young man in New York.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tPedro Hernandez appears in a Manhattan criminal court in New York on November 15, 2012. Hernandez, a former store clerk, was convicted on February 14, 2017, in one of the nation\u2019s most haunting missing-child cases, nearly 38 years after Etan Patz disappeared while heading to his school bus stop. (AP Photo\/Louis Lanzano, Pool, File)<\/p>\n

Hernandez then told police \u2014 after seven hours of questioning and before being told he had a right to remain silent \u2014 that he had strangled Etan in the shop basement after enticing him there with the offer of a soda. Hernandez was later read his rights and recapped his statement on video, telling authorities: \u201cSomething just took over me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Defense lawyers said all of Hernandez\u2019s admissions amounted to the imaginings of a mentally ill and intellectually limited man, haunted and confused by a highly publicized tragedy that had happened near his workplace.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe delusion, now squarely implanted with the image of Etan Patz, is, to him, an event as seemingly real as any of our most vivid memories,\u201d defense lawyers Harvey Fishbein and Alice Fontier wrote in court papers recently.<\/p>\n

His 2015 trial ended in a jury deadlock, a 2017 retrial yielded a conviction, and then a federal appeals court overturned the verdict. The court said the 2017 trial judge mishandled a jury question about determining the validity of Hernandez\u2019s confessions.<\/p>\n

The Manhattan district attorney\u2019s office pledged to retry the case but also asked the US Supreme Court to restore Hernandez\u2019s conviction. The high court isn\u2019t obliged to hear the case and hasn\u2019t yet said whether it will.<\/p>\n

\t\"A<\/a>
\n\t\tA flyer distributed by the New York Police Department of Etan Patz, who vanished in New York on May 25, 1979. (photo credit: courtesy NYPD\/AP)<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Hernandez\u2019s lawyers asked Rodney to toss out the charges. The defense contended that prosecutors waited too long to charge Hernandez and that he can\u2019t get a fair trial now that some witnesses have died, others\u2019 memories have faded, and prospective jurors have been steeped in decades of publicity about the case, plus coverage of the two prior trials.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors called the arguments baseless. Once police got \u201ca direct, reliable tip,\u201d they arrested Hernandez two weeks later, and witnesses\u2019 patchy memories are \u201csimply the nature of a criminal trial,\u201d Assistant District Attorney Sarah Marquez wrote in court papers.<\/p>\n


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